Balulalow
by Vampiric Charms
Summary: What should be a standard investigation takes a startling turn, all while the person behind everything remains hidden. J/W, In-Progress.
1. Chapter 1

**Long time, no see - but I've finally returned! I hope everyone had a wonderful holiday season. I do apologize for the delay in getting something posted; I'd actually started writing a completely different story - which will come after this one - when I decided something needed to come before that one. So I stopped work on the one I had begun and then brainstormed for this. So far I only have about four chapters written and I'm thinking it won't be too much longer than that.**

**As far as timeline: Like the others, this takes place after the end of the series, and now after _Fear Itself_ and _Eden_ (though you do not need to read either to read this). Some plot details are taken from those stories, specifically the marriage and their home in Boston, but nothing is absolutely integral. This is set right around Christmas, so late December.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own any of these characters. I also do not claim to have any background or education in medicine, so mistakes you may find in that regard are mine.**

**Now read and enjoy!**

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_"...The task of rooting out evil in its most devious forms, often just when it is about to go unchecked, is a crucial and solemn undertaking."  
- Kazuo Ishiguro_, When We Were Orphans

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**_Balulalow_  
Chapter 1**

Jordan fiddled with the small piece of paper in her hands, her eyes staring sightlessly at the snow tumbling through the darkness outside her office window, piling in the sill. A newly found name and family contact were scribbled on the paper her fingers were starting to crumble and, since Lily had already long left for the day, she would have to make the call herself. After a lingering moment, she sighed and stared down at the information. This was a part of her job she had been doing since the beginning, and one she was good at, but she still hated to be the bearer of news that tore families apart.

Finally, she smoothed the sheet out on her desktop and picked up her phone, finding an outside line and dialing the number. It wasn't so late yet that many people would be in bed, and a woman answered on the third ring.

"Hello?"

Jordan quietly cleared her throat. "I'm trying to reach Joy Waters, please?"

"Yeah, this is she," the woman replied gruffly. "I was just about to eat dinner, so if this is some kind of sales thing, you're wasting your time."

"I'm sorry, Miss Waters, no, I'm not trying to sell anything. My name is Jordan Cavanaugh and I work with the medical examiner's office." A movement in the doorway of her office made her eyes flick up, and she saw Woody standing there awkwardly. He'd heard the last few words she'd said and he quickly closed his mouth before interrupting. The woman on the phone gasped during her pause, and Jordan continued before she could ask any questions she had no answers for. "I am so sorry, but I think we may have your daughter here. We need someone to come help us make sure we have the correct identification."

"I…I, uh…" Her voice faded off, but she came back quickly, words thick with new tears. "My Kendra is dead?"

"We're afraid so, Miss Waters." Jordan stared at that piece of paper again, her heart tight as she ran her finger down the side of it. "Do you need someone to come pick you up? We would be more than willing to send a car for you."

There was a tense silence before she responded in the negative, and Jordan promised to meet her, hold her hand through it all, as soon as she got off the elevator.

"Guess those dinner plans are nixed then, huh?" Woody asked softly as soon as she hung up the phone.

She gave him a wan grin. "Looks that way. Sorry."

"You've already said 'sorry' too much tonight. Don't say it to me, too, when it's not your fault." He came all the way into her office instead of continuing to hover in the doorway, kissing the top of her head before dropping heavily on the sofa and leaning his head back so he could close his eyes. It had been a long day for both of them, and he had been looking forward to some Italian food and dancing that night. "What's going on?"

Jordan shrugged, letting out an exhausted sigh and looking out at the swirling snow again. She could imagine it stacking up on the streets and sidewalks and tops of the lampposts, or on the trees and shrubbery in front of their house. Quite suddenly, she wished desperately she were sitting on the couch in her living room under a blanket watching this snow from the big window there. Maybe wrapped in Woody's arms, maybe starting their first fire in the fireplace. But then she remembered what was currently taking up most of the space in that living room, and she quickly blinked the image away.

"Another drug overdose," she finally answered his question, running a hand down her face and then over her hair to pull the tie out so it could fall down across her shoulders in loose tangles. It had been in the ponytail so long that her scalp began to tingle. "Hers is the fourth OD in less than two weeks," she continued softly. "It's just…off, I guess. I haven't finished the autopsy, though; the body just got here this afternoon, only long enough to get the initial blood work done."

Woody wet his lips, his eyes fixed on her as she used both hands this time to fluff out her hair in an attempt to get the uncomfortable tingling to stop. "Is it weird? That many ODs?"

"When it's from the same drug and one gender in the same age group? Yes." When her attempts failed, she just pulled the ponytail back into place, her lips pursing thinly in veiled agitation. "Look, Woody, go on home. This might take a while. Besides, I know you hate these types of cases."

He stood and stretched his arms up over his head briefly, then let them drop down to his sides again, trying to smother a yawn. "You _are_ going to come home, though, aren't you? You're not going to sleep here or anything?"

She chuckled softly at his concern, standing as well and walking over to stop in front of him, resting both hands on his chest. His arms came around her waist unconsciously. "What, are you worried I'm going to abandon you for my work?" she asked slyly. "Perish the thought. On such a freezing night like this, I want to sleep in my own bed under about five blankets and next to a warm body instead of in a building with hundreds of cold ones." She leaned up to give him a quick kiss on the lips, which seemed to appease him enough that his face lost the tight lines around his eyes. "Go home. I'll be there in a few hours."

She stepped out of his arms toward her desk to pick up a file and he nodded. "I'll wait up for you," he offered.

"It'll probably be after midnight," she admonished lightly, but she couldn't help the small smile from pulling her lips back when he came up behind her to sneak his arms around her again, resting his forehead heavily against one of her shoulder blades.

"Well," he amended, "I can try." This time he wasn't able to hide the yawn, and it was a large one. After a moment, he added, "And since tomorrow is Saturday and we both actually have the day off together, you wanna decorate our tree? It's starting to look kind of sad."

Jordan paused at that, and she hoped he didn't notice when her back started to stiffen. "Um, sure."

"Great." He dropped his arms, resting his hands on her hips for a second while he kissed her cheek and then made his way toward the door. He buttoned up his jacket, which he hadn't even taken off, as he went. "I'll see you soon, Jo. Drive safely in this snow, okay?"

"You too, Farm Boy."

And then he was gone, shuffling down the hallway toward the elevators. _That stupid tree_, she thought in frustration as she watched him go. _I should have just told him before he bought the damn thing_.

xXx

"Garret, good! You're still here!"

The chief looked up from his desk, loaded high with the paperwork he was trying to finish, instantly wary at the chipper sound of Jordan's voice at quarter after midnight. She was leaning against his doorframe, a form and four files in her hand. "What do you want?" he asked, his lips turned down at the corners.

"Sheesh, man, no need to look so unhappy to see me," she said playfully as she sauntered over to the front of his desk, her arms crossing to hide what she was holding.

"Well," Macy muttered, taking off his glasses to rub the bridge of his nose, "when you're working this late and come to see me, also _this late_, it is rarely for a chat. I didn't even know you were still here. Didn't I see Woody leave about four hours ago?" He just waved his hand dismissively before she could answer, and she shut her mouth dramatically. "Don't even bother. What do you want?"

"Right, well -" She stuck the single form in front of him, blocking what he had been working on. "I want these two cases to be signed over to me, so I'd be the main M.E. on them. Er, please."

"Why?" he asked bluntly, looking at her instead of the paper she was trying to get him to take by waving it in his face.

She sighed in annoyance and glowered at him. "There are four bodies total from the last twelve days, including one that came in today – all young women in their mid- to early twenties. They look like heroine ODs, but I think something else is going on. Two came in on my rotation, so they're already my cases. I want the other two. _Please_."

"'Think something else is going on' based on what, exactly?" Garret pried, raising an eyebrow.

"My _gut_, okay?" Jordan shot back, her temper rising just a bit. She pushed it down.

"Who had the first two?"

He had finally taken the form from her and was perusing it without much interest, but it was a start. So Jordan answered as calmly as she could, "Bug. He did everything by the book, I just…want to do another autopsy on his two before the bodies are claimed."

"To prove yourself right?" Garret set the paper down and put his hand over it without signing anything so he could set her with a pointed glare.

"_No_," Jordan said vehemently. She took a sharp breath before continuing slowly. "No. It's just…the last two bodies didn't show any history of drug use, and…and the mother of the last confirmed that her daughter had never used drugs. She was home for Christmas from MIT, Garret. Come on. No drug use, and then _heroin_? One top of three other ODs in twelve days? Doesn't it sound just a little weird to you? If there's something new on the street…."

He looked at her for a long moment, letting out the breath he had been holding and then signing the bottom of the form. Jordan grinned, but quickly hid it and tried to plaster an innocent, wide-eyed expression on her face. "Fine. At least you're actually following procedure instead of just…_doing it_. Consider this a reward for good behavior. Let me know if you find anything."

"Thanks, boss!"

She snatched the form back without another word and dashed down the hall to the crypt, wanting to get a full blood workup started on all four so it would be ready when she got back the next morning.

xXx

Woody was, in fact, sound asleep by the time she got home well after one o'clock in the morning. All the lights were still on downstairs when she unlocked the front door, bringing the undecorated tree in the corner by the fireplace into immediate view as soon as she stepped inside. She scowled at it as she tossed her purse onto the couch and turned away toward the kitchen to find something to eat. A can of tomato soup poured into a mug heated in the microwave would do just fine, and she sluggishly went about preparing it, leaving the drips on the granite to wait till morning.

The soup was downed in about five gulps, and she sighed, plopping the mug into the sink with a noisy clatter and leaning against the counter in the dark. The house was warm, making it easy for her to finally relax after the last few hours at work, and she rolled her shoulders a few times. It was something. She knew it was. Maybe not murder. _Or was it? _she thought, frowning slightly. _How could someone murder with heroine?_ But still, it was off somehow.

She would find the answer. She _would_. Tomorrow.

"Shower," she muttered listlessly, starting to feel how exhausted she was after working for almost two days straight. Running a heavy hand over her face, she used what was left of her strength to push away from the counter and drag herself up the stairs. Woody was asleep in bed, facing the wall, when she entered their room and she couldn't help the crooked smile that pulled her lips back. At least there was always one constant in her life now, despite all the other questions she was constantly trying to answer.

A sudden pang clenched her stomach when she realized she hadn't asked how his day was when he'd been in her office earlier, or why he had been so tired himself. He must have had a rough day. Not for the first time, she realized her thumb was unconsciously moving the wedding band on her finger up and down. She wouldn't be surprised if a shiny patch was growing on the metal there, given how often in a day she caught herself doing that. She stopped.

After a long moment, Jordan slipped off her shoes near the door and crept forward to turn off the lamp on his bedside table, casting the room in silvery darkness as the moonlight bounced off the piled snow outside. She touched the side of his face lightly, letting her fingers brush down his stubbly cheek before pulling away.

"Shower," she murmured again, this time stumbling toward the bathroom and leaving a trail of clothes behind her as she went without a care. It was only fifteen minutes later – just enough of a shower to wash the smell of the morgue off of her skin and out of her hair – that she got into bed still sopping wet and quite naked, too tired to even bother putting on pajamas.

Jordan's sleep was restless, filled with flitting, figureless dreams, and she hardly felt as though she had slept at all when she woke the next morning, bright sunlight streaming through the sheer curtains and Woody spooned, still dozing, behind her.

She was just starting to consider getting out of bed, starting a pot of coffee, and calling Nigel to see if her blood work was finished yet when Woody stretched and then snuggled closer, pulling the warm blankets tighter around them both. "Morning," he whispered in her ear, voice still thick with sleep.

"Morning," she replied lazily, quickly deciding against moving just yet when he kissed the back of her neck.

"You got home late last night," he pointed out needlessly as he lifted himself slightly to press his lips to the soft spot behind her jaw, then her cheek, then her chin. But then he stopped and added, in a mocking hurt, "You didn't wake me."

Her eyes slid closed and she rolled in his arms so she was on her back instead of having to twist her head to see him. She pouted playfully when he refused to kiss her again. "You didn't ask me to wake you up when I got home," she protested. "It _was_ late. You…looked tired?"

He chuckled and dipped his head to the place where her shoulder and neck met, and she grinned contentedly when she felt his warm breath there as he spoke. "Excuses," he murmured, sliding a leg between hers as he dragged his mouth slowly back up toward her ear before pulling away slightly so he could meet her eyes. Hers were filled with warmth, and he stroked her cheek. "You didn't sleep well."

"So I woke you after all?" she muttered with a lopsided smile. "Sorry. Guess I was just over-tired or something."

"Or maybe it was the case you were burning the midnight oil on keeping your brain spinning?" It wasn't really a question, and she punched him lightly on the arm. He propped himself up on an elbow and smiled back at her, his free hand running over her hair now. "You wanna talk about it?"

She shook her head, and suddenly one of the thoughts from the previous night came tumbling back – that she had never asked him why he had been so tired himself. 'Selfish' wasn't necessarily a word that could be used to describe her, no…but when she got caught up in something, she could easily forget everyone not involved, even Woody. She covered his hand with hers when it reached her neck.

"What about you?" she asked, keeping his gaze easily with hers and reading a cascade of emotions there. "Are you okay?"

"I'm fine," he murmured, moving his hand from hers and using it to cup her cheek. "You came home last night, Jo. That's all I wanted."

Jordan raised an eyebrow, hearing the sincerity in his words but still not quite used to that amount of love to know what to say. Instead, she just gave him a Cheshire-like grin in an attempt to keep the mood light. "You're kidding, right? You just didn't want me to spend the night in my office?"

He laughed lowly, knowing exactly what she was doing and letting her do it without protest. "Not kidding," he replied in the same joking manner even as he moved slightly so he was on top of her now. "I want to spend the entire day with you, beginning to end. This? Is a pretty nice start." His hand, the one that had been on her cheek, moved to her hip – only for him to jerk it back in surprise. "Jesus, you're naked! How did that happen?"

"Wow, you are _some_ detective, and apparently far too courteous with your hands even in your sleep." When he just blushed, still hovering over her with an expression somewhere between surprise and lust on his face, she had mercy and added, "I slept this way. And, for the record, I didn't wake you because you really did look tired."

In a surge of emotion, he shifted most of his weight to his legs so he could take her face in both of his hands. "You're wonderful, Jordan. You are." She gave him a small smile, unsure of what to say to that, and he ran his thumbs gently across her cheeks. He leaned down and, just before taking her lips in a kiss filled with the passion she was having a difficult time find the words for, he whispered, "I love you."

They had hardly had a chance to pull off his flannel shirt, however, when the doorbell rang – followed by a sharp pounding on the front door that did not stop.

"What the hell?" Jordan muttered angrily, sliding out from under him and finding her heavy fleece robe to pull on before she descended the stairs.

"Jo!" she heard Woody call after her, quickly finding his shirt again and turning his head this way and that to find his own robe so he wouldn't be answering the door in a…compromising position. "Jordan, wait!"

She knew it was because she still didn't have any other clothes on, but she didn't care. It was rude, calling on someone like this at nine o'clock in the morning on a Saturday, and she was going to tell them so. Her eyebrows knitted and an angry retort ready on her tongue, she unlocked the door and threw it open, only to see…Nigel, standing there freezing on her porch.

The words died in her mouth, but her agitated expression only deepened and she blocked his way inside when he tried to move past her into the warmth of the house and out of the wind and snow. "Nigel!" she barked, just as Woody came up behind her, tugging his robe closed. "What the _hell_ are you doing here?"

"I have been trying to call you for the last two hours!" he responded crossly, coming inside immediately when Woody took Jordan's shoulders and moved her to the side. She glared at both of them. "Doctor Macy wants you to come in as soon as you can – right now, really. He saw the results of the blood tests you ordered. May I also add that Bug is none too happy with you at the moment for undermining him and taking his cases? Nor am I, now that you've shown me so little hospitality. I could desperately use a cup of coffee."

"Screw the coffee Nigel," Jordan hissed even as Woody padded into the kitchen to start the pot and effectively remove himself from the line of fire. "Why did the results of those blood tests get everyone worked up?"

"Because heroine was not the cause of death for those four young women. Cyanide was."


	2. Chapter 2

**Thank you to everyone who has been reading, and to those who have reviewed. It truly means a lot to me! And in response to a question I received by a reviewer who needs to translate my works: The Balulalow is a Christmas lullaby that originated in Scotland, so I'm not terribly surprised the word does not have an exact translation! This would have come up a little later in the story, but it will not spoil anything by saying so now.**

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**Balulalow **  
**Chapter 2**

Only two hours later, Jordan was in the morgue again, all four bodies pulled into the autopsy bay so she could look at them side-by-side. Every one of them had lethal levels of cyanide of their systems, but that was the only similarity they shared.

Marla, the first victim, had floated up in the icy harbor eleven days ago. She had stringy blond hair, dark brown eyes, and pale skin thin as paper. Marla was the only one who had other drugs in her system, mostly heroin – an easy call as a sure-thing OD, since she showed every sign as an addict who had been living on the streets for at least six months. Her prints had been in the system with a prior arrest for drugs.

Bethany had been found three days later in an alley nowhere near the harbor, but with large amounts of heroin showing up on her tox screen. She'd been signed off as another OD, though now it was obvious the cyanide was her COD as well. Compared to Marla's blond looks, Bethany had had curly black hair and dark blue eyes, and skin tanned from a life in the sun. Neither Marla nor Bethany had any family.

Rosaline came in two days after Bethany, the daughter of a large family who had moved to Boston from Italy twenty years ago. Her sobbing father had told Jordan that she had been named from Shakespeare. No prior drug use, but her system had been filled with so much heroin that it hadn't even known how to begin processing it; her body had completely shut down. This second blood test, however, proved that it was actually the cyanide that had caused her body to fail, though the heroin would have done so regardless.

And now Kendra, who had shown up three days after Rosaline – a smart, talented black woman who had also never done drugs a day in her life, on her winter break from what would have been a wonderful education at MIT.

Absolutely nothing to connect these four young women except the cause of their deaths and their close ages.

Jordan was sure now that it was homicide. All four had very light, easily missed contusions around their wrists and ankles – easy to overlook in an individual examination, though now that all four were together it was so _obviously_ intentional.

Nigel pushed his way into the autopsy bay, pausing when he saw how deep in thought she was. "Not interrupting you, am I?" he asked in hesitation.

She shook her head distractedly and pulled the mask off of her nose and mouth. "Not really," she muttered, growing agitated as she tossed it into the biohazard bin. "There's no pattern here, Nige! None! But these women had to have been chosen for a reason."

"At least we caught the COD, though, love," he said, watching cautiously as she paced back to the bodies. The familiar obsession was starting to emerge, and he wasn't quite sure what to do. So, hoping it was the right thing to say, he continued with, "I called the precinct, by the way. It appears the homicide department is quite loaded down at the moment, so they are assigning the new baby Chandler to the case. Woody is to be joining him. As a babysitter, I presume. They should be here any minute."

That did not help Jordan in the least, and she spun around, her eyes wide and suddenly angry. "Woody's been assigned to this case? Why did you let them do that, Nigel?"

"Well, I.." The words fell off when he saw the lost expression on her face and he just shook his head. "I – I don't know. I just assumed that if his chief decided it was okay, it was okay! Why?" he asked, turning the question on her with a shrewd glance. "Is something the matter?"

Jordan shook her head quickly, refusing to look at him. Her heart had started to thud loudly in her chest, and she had to physically fight the urge to twist her wedding band on her finger through her gloves by clenching her fingers into a tight fist. She hadn't told anyone – not a single person – that she and Woody had gotten married. It wasn't like she was doing it on _purpose_, really, this strange secret-keeping it had turned into. She more hadn't found the right time and to her, this didn't seem like the thing you just burst out with from nowhere. Maybe especially for her.

"No," she said quietly after a pregnant pause. Of everyone, she knew Nigel suspected something. "Nothing is the matter. Would, um, would you please take some photographs of these contusions?" she requested, changing the subject with stubborn finality. "See if you can figure out what made them using one of your fancy programs or notebooks or something. Oh, and any luck with the stomach contents yet?"

Nigel grinned softly, understanding he had been shut down. "Not quite, but I should have answers for you there soon. I'll go get the camera."

Almost as soon as Nigel left out one set of doors, Woody and Elliot Chandler, the newest detective in their squad, came in through the other set. She glanced up at them briefly, just long enough to give Woody a glare that did nothing more than baffle him, before bending over to look at the marks on Rosaline's wrists once more.

"Nice to see you again, Detective Chandler," she said coolly, running a gloved finger along the discolored skin. The mark was less than four inches wide – almost three and a half, to be exact – and there was a line running through the center of it. Rosaline's were the darkest of the four women's; she may have fought the hardest, she may have had a seizure against her constraints, or she may have been tied the tightest. Still, though, the bruise was so light it was an easy thing to miss, especially around her ankles where such a mark could have been made simply from socks that were too tight worn for too long.

Woody cleared his throat, bringing her attention back up to him from the body. She pulled a sheet up over her as he said, "Have anything for us?"

His smile quickly faded when he saw the anger still evident in her expression. "I need to talk to you. Now." She walked around the autopsy table, peeling off her gloves as she went, and grabbed his upper arm to drag him from the room. "A copy of the file is on the counter, Elliot, I'll be right back," she called over her shoulder as she used her other hand to continue pushing Woody out into the hall and toward her office. Chandler just watched them, utterly baffled and reaching blindly for the file as instructed.

"What are you doing?" Jordan hissed angrily the second the door clicked behind them.

Woody looked at her in confusion, surprised at the rising emotion in her voice. "What are you talking about?" he asked, taking a step back from her and leaning against the desk rather than sitting on the couch.

She came close and poked him in the chest with her index finger, her eyes narrowed. "You know exactly what I'm talking about!" she retorted irately. "You can't be on this case! Ask to have someone else put on it!"

"What?" He pushed her hand away and shoved back from the desk, putting more space between them again. Her incensed fury was contagious and he rounded on her quickly, only just keeping his temper in check. "Why the hell should I do that? You were so excited about this case last night! What, do you not want to work with me anymore? Is that it? Do you think I'm bad at my job?"

"No, I don't want to work with you on this!" she yelled back, fully aware that their voices were starting to carry through the hall. Her heart started to pound again when he turned an angry glare on her, but she didn't cower back. Instead she brought her tone back down to a furious whisper. "What were you thinking, taking this assignment! You know a case could get tossed if it gets to trial, if it comes out we were married this whole time and didn't tell anyone! We're on shaky ground with the evidence so far as it is! Don't you think the prosecution could have a field day with this?"

Woody was stunned into silence at that, but the lapse didn't last long. "Fine," he shot back heatedly. "We can fix it right now. Go tell your boss we got hitched back in August. Let him deal with the consequences of your actions." When she didn't respond, his lip curled in an ugly sneer. "Oh, that's right, I forgot - you're keeping it a _secret_."

His last remark hurt and her face fell, but she refused to let the tears that started to burn her eyes fall. "I am not keeping this a 'secret' and you know it. How dare you say that."

The tension between them flared for a brief moment as they glowered at one another, and then his shoulders slumped. "You're right, I'm sorry," he said softly, dropping her gaze and staring at the wall behind her. "For the 'secret' remark, I'm sorry. But I'm not sorry for doing my job the way I'm told."

Jordan let out a long sigh. There were still a few flecks of snow on the shoulders of his jacket and in his wind-messed hair, and she stepped forward to gently brush them away. He caught her hand as it passed his face and pulled it toward his chest. "Do you regret it?" he breathed quietly. "Do you regret…what we -"

"No," she was quick to interrupt, attempting to smile wanly at him. "I do not regret it. Don't be silly."

Despite her words, though, she stepped away from him quickly then, pulling her hand from his just as Nigel knocked on the door and let himself inside without waiting for an invitation. Woody watched her, his stomach knotted, as she sat at her desk. The criminologist paused when he noticed the odd air between the pair, but Jordan leaned back in her chair and cleared her throat. "What do you have, Nige?"

"Right – stomach contents have been fully analyzed," Nigel finally said, coming all the way inside to hand her a piece of paper. She took it silently, her eyes immediately beginning to read over the contents. "It is very interesting indeed."

Her forehead wrinkled in confusion as her brain processed what she was reading. "Tetraodontidae?" she asked incredulously. "In the stomach contents of three out of four? Seriously?"

Woody glanced between them at a loss, his eyebrows shooting up. "Tetra-what's-its?"

"Pufferfish," Jordan answered distractedly.

"I just double checked them all again to be sure," Nigel said, nodding excitedly. "Small amounts, but food – not toxins. There were also varying amounts of other seafood, as well – salmon, shrimp, tuna, and so forth with rice and seaweed. The ladies' last meals were all at a Japanese restaurant that is licensed to serve the very poisonous pufferfish."

"This is our first real lead," she breathed, taking in everything the report had to offer. "Kendra last ate about seven hours before she died, Rosaline also seven, and Bethany…" She flipped a file on her desk open and found the third report quickly. "Bethany, eight hours. The contents are all just a little different but yeah, they all ate pufferfish and rice, and some other fish. I'll be damned."

"Now," Nigel began, sitting heavily on her couch facing the other two and balancing his own file on his thighs. "Pufferfish caught from mid-Atlantic coastal waters are not toxic and are safe to eat, hence they are _not_ regulated. Anyone can buy or prepare the fish in any restaurant. But any other pufferfish is highly toxic and is _extremely_ regulated. It is only caught and shipped from Shimonoseki, Japan, and then shipped into the United States to one importer in New York – Wako International – who then sends it to those few on an also highly regulated list." Here he paused a moment to pull out another piece of paper, which he handed to Jordan.

"Fascinating, really, but how does this help us?" Woody asked, watching Jordan's eyes zip quickly over the new report. "Couldn't the fish they ate be that non-regulated kind?"

Nigel held up one slender finger and smiled widely. "A very good question! This, my dear Woodrow, is why I am indispensable around here. I ran further testing on the contents of Amanda's stomach. She had eaten more pufferfish than any other the other women and, as it turns out -"

"You found trace amounts of tetrodotoxin in the meat," Jordan interrupted impatiently, "meaning this pufferfish had to initially come from Japan. We'll be able to find the restaurant by getting in touch with Wako International."

Her friend scowled. "Right, what she said. Spoiling my moment."

"That's great!" Woody's whole posture straightened when he heard this, and he looked back at Nigel. "Can you get a list of the restaurants in Boston?"

The other man just shook his head disappointedly, already sliding out yet another new piece of paper with a very short list of names on it. "Come, now, Woodrow. What kind of crime-solving genius would I be if I did not have that ready to be presented?"

"Thanks, Nige," Woody muttered as he looked over it quickly. Three restaurants in the immediate area. "I'm going to grab Chandler and jump on this right now," he said, his cell in his hand as he left the office and practically sprinted down the hall.

"That's a pretty piece of sparkle," Nigel murmured as Jordan put her file back together again. "Why haven't I seen it before?"

She glanced up at him in confusion before she noticed he was eyeing her left hand – specifically, the ring on her finger. She curled her fingers toward the palm, tucking the jewelry out of his sight. "I just started wearing it," she said vaguely. "Don't you have more tests to be running?"

"Fine. Point taken." He shrugged, getting to his feet and walking away.

The door clicked softly behind him and suddenly she was quite alone. She clasped her hands, resting her chin on her knit fingers and staring across her empty office for a long moment before spinning her chair around and sliding down in it a bit, staring out the big circular window behind her desk. It was no longer snowing, but the drifts were still piled on the outside sill to catch the deepening rays of sunlight as the day slid into afternoon. Gave the illusion of peace.

So many people had asked her over the years why she did this job, why she _enjoyed_ it so much. Because the fact was, sometimes she truly did enjoy her job. No, she did not like witnessing the atrocities that humans were capable of. Of course she didn't. But she did enjoy bringing justice to those wronged in her own way. She would not have been able to have been a police officer; she would have hated that line of work. But this – finding answers through medicine and science? She was good at it. She was _driven_ to be good at it by some force inside her that never stopped.

It was that unstoppable force, she knew, that frightened Woody sometimes. That was how she got herself on the wrong side of guns, or thrown into abandoned mineshafts, or kidnapped by murderers who wanted to use her for something – and all those other dangerous things that happened to her that she rarely batted an eyelash at as long as she got her answers in the end. It was that force that drove a wedge between them more than anything else.

Sometimes she wondered which would kill her first, the tumor or someone she got in the way of. Then she realized she didn't really care too much. Death was death, and she hadn't died yet.

The soft chirping of her cell phone brought her attention around slowly, and it took her a full fifteen seconds to answer just before the voicemail picked up. "Cavanaugh," she muttered listlessly.

"Hey, Jo," Woody responded on the other line, his voice demure. "Can we…call a truce?"

She grinned slightly, her gaze still stuck on the snowdrifts outside. "Where are you?" she asked quietly, not exactly avoiding his question but rather trying to buy time to find an answer.

"Waiting for Chandler to get the car and drive it around. I'm letting him take lead on this one," he said pointedly. He wasn't exactly saying she was _right_, but he was conceding to her point from their argument not long before. "He needs the experience, anyway. This is only his sixth homicide in Boston; it'll do him some good to get his feet wet this way on something so complicated. Jordan, are you there?"

She realized she hadn't said anything in over a minute, and she nodded even though he couldn't see it. "Yeah. Yeah, sorry. Thank you, Woody."

"Hey," he whispered, "if, um, if you do want to tell people…would you like to have a Christmas party? We could, you know, use it as an excuse to out ourselves then. That way you wouldn't have to worry about this kind of thing anymore."

Jordan chuckled. "You mean you just want an excuse to really shout it from the rooftops, right?"

"No, sorry, it was a stupid idea -"

"Woody, no, it was a great idea," she interjected quietly, realizing then how nervous she had made him before. He really did think she regretted their quick decision to marry, and that sudden insight made her sad. "How about this weekend, right before Christmas? I'll clean if you cook."

"Deal," he said, and she could hear the smile and relief in his voice. There was a muffled conversation on his end then, and he came back after a moment to tell her, "We've made a few calls and almost narrowed down the restaurant. I'll probably be stuck in a car watching it all night, so I won't be home until tomorrow. Oh, and Jordan? Don't come looking for me. Let Chandler and me handle this."

"Don't I always?" she said sweetly, hanging up before he had a chance to retort.

Another sharp tap at her door brought her attention back, and she spun her chair away from the window again. Lily was standing there this time holding her daughter against one hip, a wide grin on her face.

"Hey, Jordan!" Lily said happily. "You okay? You look like you have something on your mind."

Jordan shrugged and stood, coming over to run a hand over the growing baby's head, which was now covered in soft brown hair. "I'm fine, just lost in thought, I guess. What're you doing here? Weren't you off today?"

"Oh, yeah! Just came to pick up Bug so we could go get a late lunch. I saw you in here and wanted to come say hi." She switched the little girl to her other hip, kissing the side of her head. "I also wanted to formally invite you to our Christmas party, this weekend. It's Maddie's first Christmas, you know, and our first Christmas as a family, so we wanted to invite all of you to come celebrate it with us."

In a flash, Jordan's heart tightened when she saw what was happening, her own plans falling apart before they had even really begun. It was an odd sensation, one she wasn't used to. But she grinned in return, hiding everything she was feeling and showing Lily only an excited exterior. "That's great, Lil. It sounds like a lot of fun."

"So you'll be there? Woody's invited too, of course."

"Yeah," Jordan said in what she hoped was a convincing tone. "Sure."

"Great. Oh, there's Bug! I'll see you later, Jordan." And then she shuffled off down the hall to meet the person she had come for, diaper bag over her shoulder bouncing against her back.

Forcing her thoughts to go back to the case, Jordan sat gently behind her desk again and spread the file out in front of her, prepared to go over every detail once more. She would not let this be tossed out in court because of a personal technicality.


	3. Chapter 3

**As always, thank you to everyone who has been reading and especially to those of you who have been kind enough to leave reviews.**

* * *

_**Balulalow **_  
**Chapter 3**

"So this is the place?"

Woody scowled as Jordan opened the door and lowered herself into the unmarked police car's passenger side. "I told you not to come, Jo," he growled, lowering the binoculars to his lap to glare at her.

She just shrugged and handed him a paper bag with food inside, followed by a bottle of water from her purse. "You need to eat. Besides, I parked around the corner. No one followed me. Okay, Detective?"

Still grumbling under his breath about their cover being blown, he took the bag and looked inside. A sandwich from his favorite deli. His anger deflated just a bit. While he did that, Jordan peered out the window across the street at the innocuous Japanese restaurant. It was extremely small and in a bad part of town, but if its reputation was correct, a very good chef was working in there. Deserving of the "hole-in-the-wall" title, if anything was.

Finally answering her first question, Woody sighed and cracked open the bottle of water to take a quick swig. "This was the only restaurant of the three that has staff who remembers seeing our victims, though they can't remember who came in with them. It was the same guy, one night apart with each, and he paid in cash. We _kind_ of have a description," he continued, gesturing to the file she had sat on when she got in the car, "but not enough for a composite. The place doesn't have cameras. We're just waiting to see if he shows up."

"Based on a loose description that could fit half the guys who walk in?" Jordan asked in surprise without even bothering to read the newest report. "You were approved for surveillance based on _that_?"

He shrugged, glancing back at the restaurant himself. "I just do what I'm told. Now would you go home, please?"

"No," she retorted indignantly, snatching the binoculars from his lap and looking through them herself. There wasn't much to see. The restaurant was packed with people. This whole endeavor seemed pointless. "Aren't you supposed to have a partner for these things?"

"He's coming back soon. He had to go see his mother." He grabbed the binoculars again, much to her annoyance. "If you won't go home, go back to the morgue. It's not safe for you to be here."

"Mhmm, whatever."

"How did you even know I was here?" he asked, glowering at her briefly as he realized he had only told her he wouldn't be home that night when they had talked on the phone a few hours earlier.

She smirked playfully. "Power of deduction."

"What?" he muttered, only half paying attention to her now as a couple came walking up the street. The man could have fit the description he had been given and the woman was in the age range of the victims, and he was thinking quickly of what to do since Jordan was refusing to leave.

"Haven't you ever read _Sherlock Holmes_?"

"No," he answered distractedly, not even hearing the question at all this time as he reached for the door handle. "Really, Jordan, go home now. I need to talk to someone. Be gone when I get back."

He had opened the door and slid out of the car before she'd even had a chance to get angry. His words were sinking in, however, and she frowned as she watched him sprint across the street to intercept a man and woman on the opposite sidewalk. "Fine," she whispered to herself, growing agitated. "_Fine_. I just bring you food and offer to keep you company, but _fine_."

She had hardly gotten out of the car, though, when she heard footsteps on the partly frozen cement behind her. She stiffened, just having time to open her purse and throw it back in through the open car door before someone grabbed her from behind, clasping an odd-smelling cloth over her nose and mouth.

The contents of her bag spilled all over the passenger floorboard as she grabbed at the hand against her face, using her short nails to scratch. They met a leather glove rather than skin, the person not feeling any pain. She tried to kick backward, and swung both feet up off the ground to throw them off balance enough to slip on some ice. But then they were moving, and she remembered the alleys nearby, and she knew they would be gone by the time Woody got back. Quickly, feeling her consciousness start to fade in and out, she used one foot to push the shoe off the other. Senses heightened by adrenaline heard it plop on the pavement and then she was out, forced by whatever drug was on that cloth.

She had left two clues for Woody to follow – if he'd only notice them.

xXx

"Well, that was a waste of my time," Woody mumbled as he ambled back to the car fully expecting Jordan to have ignored his request and to still be there. "Not our guy."

He received no response and, as he got closer, he leaned forward a bit to look inside the windows. "You left the door open, Jordan?" he asked no one. "Thanks, now the car is going to be freezing. Way to be passive-aggressive." But, when he reached his door, he noticed the scuffed bottom of her brown leather purse, upside down, and paused in confusion before slowly making his way around the other side of the car. "Jordan?"

His heart started to beat loudly in his ears when he saw the bag upturned on the floor, the contents spilled.

"Jordan!" he called again, starting to panic now as he spun around. He could see her footprints in the thinning snow walking away from the car, and then evidence of another set that was too large to be hers from earlier - then the two meeting, and hers skidding, then sliding, away. He ran to follow them a little further, trying to keep his apart from the trail, and saw where another alley led clearly to the main street. Her shoe was left behind about halfway down, wet and forlorn in the shadows.

Growing numb with alarm and fear now, Woody unclipped his radio and opened the frequency to the station dispatcher as he sprinted down the alley and onto the abandoned sidewalk. There were skidmarks in the slush by the street where a car had left abruptly. Confirming his worst fear, Jordan's own car was still parked down the road, untouched.

"This is Detective Woody Hoyt," he stammered, almost surprised when the dispatcher came over the opened line to interrupt his tumbling thoughts, and he rushed to give his badge number and location. "I need backup and a forensics team out here immediately."

"You got it, Detective," the young man responded, already sending out his request. "What happened?"

"Someone's been abducted," Woody breathed, starting to feel dizzy now. "Jordan Cavanaugh. Make sure that's broadcasted in case someone sees her. And also request Nigel Townsend be sent to the scene."

xXx

The first thing Jordan became aware of was a throbbing in her head, followed by the fact that she was lying on something at least moderately soft.

She groaned, a hand coming shakily up to her face. There wasn't any blood there, fresh or dried, and nothing felt tender. She took a deep breath. Her throat burned a little and it was incredibly scratchy from not having anything to drink in who knew how long, but her lungs felt somewhat okay after inhaling whatever type of drug that was. No large bruises on her body that she could feel right away.

"So you're awake, huh?"

Jordan started at the sudden voice, her eyes snapping open far too quickly as she almost rolled off of the cot she had been placed on to find out who was in the room with her. She quickly focused on a woman, her dark skin glowing from the fire she was trying to build in the tiny fireplace on the opposite side of the room.

"Who are you?" Jordan rasped, sitting up so she would feel less vulnerable from the cot.

"Madge," the other woman said, not even looking at her. "Or you can _call_ me Madge, anyway. Like the actress."

"Which one?"

She just smiled wanly, finally turning to see her new companion. Her eyes were dark and watery, but there were small lines around the corners, as if she had spent the previous fifty-odd years laughing at things no one would ever know. "I like you."

Jordan gave her a small, wary grin in return, feeling an odd trust starting to build between them despite the situation. "Thanks. Um, what exactly am I doing here?"

Madge shrugged, going back to getting her little fire going stronger. There didn't seem to be any other light or source of heat in the room, and it was chilly. "We were told to get some leverage, and you were it. Sorry about that."

"…Leverage?"

"You're a cop, right?" Madge asked with a slight lift of her bony shoulders. "We found the badge clipped to your jacket pocket. And you were in that other cop's car. So we're just gonna use you as a bargaining chip and then send you back."

Jordan was silent for a minute, thinking quickly over everything she had been told so far. They had assumed she was a cop when they saw her badge, so they must not have read the thing. The actual license said "Medical Examiner" quite clearly above her name. So…would it be worth anything to tell them she wasn't with the police? Or would that hurt her position? "What, um, what bargaining?"

The woman got a cup of water from the mantle and walked over with it. Jordan took it cautiously, smelling the liquid surreptitiously while the other's back was turned before actually drinking it. Madge shrugged again, leaning against the wall. "Someone we know wants you guys to stop investigating something."

"And you think taking me will make them stop?"

"I dunno," she sighed, crossing her thin arms tightly over her chest and staring down into the flames. "Wasn't my idea. I think it's stupid. No good ever comes from hurting others."

Jordan could see she was telling the truth. She was just being dragged along for the ride, and she didn't like it. "Am I in your room?" she asked, glancing around to get a better idea of her surroundings. There wasn't much to see. The window was boarded up – whether to keep out the cold or prying eyes, she wasn't sure – and the few personal touches were a framed picture that was upside down on the mantle where the cup of water had been and an old, tattered suitcase that was flipped closed, on its back in the corner. A few bits of clothing could be seen hanging out between the unzipped sides. The only pieces of furniture were the well-used cot she was currently sitting on and a vanity with a cracked mirror and chipping yellow paint.

"Yeah, but I don't care."

"What…" She paused again, trying to weigh her next question. "What did you use to drug me?"

"It wasn't me," Madge snapped, her eyes flashing as she looked at her again. "And I don't know what it was. That person just brought us the stuff yesterday with instructions."

Jordan nodded, her gaze focused on the faded plastic of the cup in her hands. It looked like it was from the sixties and near its last leg, if the many deep cracks were any indication. Somehow staring at it like that helped keep her calm while she parsed all of this new information about her current situation. "And how long was I unconscious?"

"'Bout twelve hours."

"So…it's about seven in the morning, then?" She received a brief nod. "Has, uh, anyone made the ransom call yet?"

"I guess Jay has, I wasn't there. I heard him talking a few hours ago." Madge snatched some paper out of a box near the fireplace and tossed it into the fire to keep the blaze going when it started to flicker, only sitting back when she was content the wood would fully catch.

"Right," Jordan said, her brain moving quickly now. "Am…am I free to walk around?"

"I don't give a shit what you do," the woman answered, pulling a hair tie off her thin wrist to quickly braid her dark hair and not looking at her anymore. "Just don't leave here."

"No problem," she muttered. She swung her legs over the side of the cot and remembered quickly that she'd lost a shoe when one foot immediately got cold. Scowling, she pulled off the other shoe, too, and tossed it away. There were lights on in the hallway when she opened the door, so it was just Madge's room that was only lit by the fire; the rest of the place had electricity, though the building was very cold, as if the furnace had long since broken. She crept down the hall, her socked feet not making a sound on the ragged carpet runner.

She was in an old two- or three-story apartment of some kind. It was narrow, and all the rooms were on one side. There was a stairway that led down at the end of the hall, and she went that way. She couldn't hear any cars, and the wind was loud from the way the building was facing. She knew she should feel like she was in danger here, but for some reason she didn't.

There was a small living room space with a dilapidated couch and chair on one side of the downstairs and a kitchen and dining area on the other. She went into the kitchen. She saw her badge and cell phone, which had also been in her jacket pocket, sitting on the table, next to a blond-haired man in a sweatshirt whose back was toward her. The second kidnapper – the one who had grabbed her from the car. Jay, Madge had said his name was. Her socked feet had not made any sound, and he didn't know she was there.

"So I heard you've taken me in for ransom," Jordan said bluntly from the doorway, not seeing any point to beating around the bush.

The man spun around in his chair in surprise, obviously not having expected to see her. Or at least not expecting her to be so level-headed and brusque about the whole thing. He eyed her nervously, and she could tell he had no idea what to make of her as she sat down at the table across from him. "So what if I have?" he finally retorted.

She had come up with a short-term plan once she had gotten a handle on where she stood, and she smiled at him – a smile that she knew would make him uncomfortable, as if she had more cards than he did. Which, she hoped, was true. "You've chosen a bad hostage, Jay," she said, shaking her head and casting her gaze over the bleary kitchen. The stove looked as though it only had one working burner, the refrigerator had mold growing around the side of the door, and there was a small aquarium on the counter, empty of fish but with a bowl of cloudy water, a lighter, and a handful of rags inside. Her stomach jolted when she saw it, but she continued easily. "I have a temper, for starters, and what's worse? I have this pesky tumor in my brain. Do you know what that means?"

"What?" he snapped, his dark brown eyes narrowing just enough to show his anxiety as she spoke.

"It means I need a lot of medications to stay healthy. If I don't take them…well, I could die in your care, just like that." She said it so nonchalantly, picking something from under her fingernail, that Jay didn't even have a response as she laid her cards on the table. He just stared at her in shock. "And _if_ I die in your care, you could be charged with murder. I know the district attorney, and she knows me. She'll nail you to the wall for it, if I die. Because she'd know I told you, and _she will know_ – if I die – that you withheld medical necessities."

This was mostly a lie – she would be fine without her pills for a week or so, assuming that's how long they wanted to keep her here, and assuming they wanted to keep her alive – but she hoped it would scare him enough to make him want to do something about it. Their attempt, from what she had understood so far, had been very poorly planned and he quite clearly had not assumed that the woman he stole would, of all things, be ill. A card she hated playing, no question, but she would use it for one reason. He stared at her, his freckled face pinched as she read his building nerves coolly.

"Okay, fine," he finally spat. "What goddamn drugs do you need?"

"Ones you can't get from any drugstore robbery," she shot back easily, carefully spinning the plot for her plan. Hopefully it would work. "I carry them all in my purse, which was left in the car you snatched me from – which is now in police custody. You'll have to ask someone for them."

There was a beat before be let out a slow breath and rolled his eyes. "Call someone? Are you kidding me?"

"This man," Jordan said softly, seeing a pad of paper and a pencil on the table beside Jay's arm and pulling it toward her so she could scribble out a name, a phone number, and a few of the more important medications that she didn't necessarily want to be without anyway.

Jay pulled the paper back and read what she had written. "Doctor Nigel Townsend? Who is this, your boyfriend?"

"No," she replied, subtly dropping her hands under the table to remove her wedding ring and slipping it into the pocket of her jeans. "He's a coworker. You obviously didn't actually read what you picked off me, did you?" She grabbed up her badge and flipped the case open to show him the license held in the plastic casing beside the crafted metal they had taken at face value and pointed to the capital letters across the top. "I'm a doctor, too. A medical examiner. I work with the police, sure, but I'm not a cop. You call Nigel and he will make sure I get what I need."

Jay considered her words in silence, his pale blue eyes now fixed on her license. It struck her then that it was probably a very good thing that she hadn't yet replaced it with the new one that had arrived in the mail the month before, the one that had her married name on it. Less chance for error this way, and less chance that someone – the someone who had ordered her abduction to begin with – would try to use that to their advantage. Woody was probably beside himself with worry, but she was not going to let him be dragged into this that way.

"Fine," Jay finally said again. "You're no use to us dead, even if you're not a cop. I'll call this guy for you."

As he got up to angrily stalk away, Jordan called after him, "And would you get me a box of tampons, while you're at it? Because seriously, man, the last thing you want to worry about while you're being kidnapped is -"

"Shut the fuck up, would you!" he snapped, turning back around in a huff and glaring at her.

"Is the possibility of an infection while you're bleeding out of places where the sun don't shine," she finished anyway, a wry smile on her lips. She stood up, too, pointing now at the aquarium on the counter. "Cyanide gas. That's how you knocked me out, isn't it?"

Jay's eyes narrowed and he stalked slowly back into the kitchen. "How did you know that?" he asked lowly.

"The crap you have in there," she said, leaving out everything about how she was able to make the connection immediately because of the case she was currently deep into. Suddenly things were starting to make sense. Her kidnap had been ordered by the murderer, whoever he was.


	4. Chapter 4

**I apologize for the delay in getting this chapter posted! Unfortunately life has thrown some not so good things my way, and it has taken a while to start working through them.**

**I hope you all enjoy what I have to share this time, though!**

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**_Balulalow_  
Chapter 4  
**

It was just after nine o'clock in the morning. Jordan had been gone for almost fifteen hours and, except for a useless ransom call that did nothing aside from prove the kidnappers had no idea who she was nor did they even know what they actually wanted, no headway had been made to find her.

Woody was sitting still as a statue on the sofa in her office in the morgue, watching the sunlight creep across the floor in a daze. He hadn't been able to go home, not without her. All he'd been able to do all night was either replay their last conversation in his mind and wish desperately that he hadn't been so cross with her, or he thought about that maddening phone call that had come into the precinct six hours after she had been taken.

"We have the lady cop who went missing tonight," was all they said – not even her name, but he'd known they were talking about Jordan. "Stop your investigation and we'll let her go."

The man had hung up before the answering officer could ask any questions or run a full trace. They didn't even know what investigation the guy had been talking about. Was it something Woody was working on? Was it something to do with the area they had been parked in? Was there a drug ring nearby that the person thought was being looked at? Did it have something to do with the murder case they were trying to solve? There were no answers, despite how hard Woody tried to find them, and it was both unbelievably infuriating and so distressing he wanted to curl into the fetal position in the corner to wait out the storm until someone else brought her back. But at the same time, he wanted to be out there tearing apart the city bit by bit until he found her himself.

Nigel had been able to analyze the call enough to tell them it had been a pay phone outside by a street. Somewhere. Dead end. The tire tracks had gotten nothing, since the tires were bald and the snow was thin. Another dead end. Jordan's shoe had had no trace on it, there were no fingerprints except hers, Woody's, and Chandler's on the car. All they had was the man's footprints in the slush, and from that all they could determine was that he wore a size eleven shoe. _Nothing_.

Woody rubbed his hands hard over his face, at a complete loss and feeling numb to what was going on. This couldn't really be happening, could it?

Just hours ago she had been bugging him about reading…_shit, what was it?_ He couldn't even remember everything they had talked about in the car outside of arguing, and suddenly his stomach dropped so severely he thought he would vomit.

"God, Jordan, you had better come back," he whispered sullenly to the palms of his hands. "I need you to be okay."

His words sounded hollow in the office that was usually filled with her energy. Now, the room felt dead and devoid of life. But still – he would rather be there than face their empty house. He twisted his wedding band around and around on his finger, feeling the loss of her as if it were a physical thing.

Quite abruptly, Nigel's voice rang out down the hall, muffled as he got off the elevator. Woody jumped to his feet and paced quickly to the doorway of the office to see him sprinting through the double doors from the lobby and into the morgue proper. He had his cell phone held in the air above him like it was his saving grace.

"News!" Nigel cried again in elation, running now toward Trace. "There's news! Woodrow, Doctor M.!"

Woody followed him, his tired eyes wide. "What's going on?" he asked, his hand flying up to catch the swinging lab door before it hit him in the face as the criminologist rushed past him. "Is it about Jordan?"

"Yes, it's about Jordan!" Nigel snapped irritably, setting his phone on the counter beside a computer console and quickly grabbing a specific cord to plug it into the machine. "One of her abductors called me from her phone. On her orders, no doubt, asking for her medications and other feminine items. They were too specific for it not to have come from her."

Woody's breath caught in his throat, gaze darting between the small phone and the computer program that was being pulled up. "What?" he demanded, growing confused. "What did they say? Why did she have them call you and not me?" He couldn't help the note of panic from rising in that last question, and he shut his mouth, trying to be patient while his friend worked.

Nigel glanced over at the detective, hearing the hurt in his aching voice. "Has Jordan not told you, mate?"

"Told me what?"

"I record all of the calls to my mobile," he explained as gently as he could while his fingers flew over the keyboard to open that specific recording. "She knows that. She also knows that I'd be able to analyze the recording to narrow down where she is based on the noises and such from the background. _That_ is why she had them call me."

Woody was silent. It made perfect sense. Of course it did. Jordan was brilliant, even if it made his heart constrict to know that he wasn't able to help her the way Nigel was. Tear him apart, was more like it.

"It was a man," Nigel continued. "The same man who made the first call. Only this time," he said, his tone growing distracted as he found the correct file. "There is much more for me to work with. He talked for a longer period of time, she kept him inside using her cell phone, and she said something from another location as well. Here, have a listen. I'll get the right programs running, too."

He pressed play and the recording, clear as could be, began.

"_Nigel Townsend," _he answered his phone.

"_Yeah, you know who this is. I have your, er, colleague. Jordan Cava – Cavan -"_

"_Cavanaugh, you dumbass."_ That was Jordan, her voice fainter than the man's but still clear. Woody swallowed harshly, taking faith from her bravado that she was unharmed.

"_Shut up! She says she needs some pills for some goddamned brain tumor," _the man continued in agitation. _"She says they're in her purse in some stupid pink makeup bag. She also says that since her purse was in the car, you can get them. And since I'm not planning on killing her or anything, I guess she needs those fucking pills."_

"_And some tampons!" _she called again, louder this time._ "There's a new bag of those in my purse, too!"_

"_Goddammit, lady, shut up! Look, Townsend, just get this shit for her."_

"_Okay, mate,"_ Nigel said over his phone, his recorded voice surprised. _"I can get these things, no problem. But how do I get them to you?"_

There was a muffled pause as Jordan and her captor argued in hushed undertones, likely while the receiver of the phone was being held against something soft. After a short few seconds, the man's voice came back on the line. _"You can meet Madge in the Boston Common, by the Soldiers and Sailors. Noon. Don't try anything or you really won't see her again."_

"_I'll send a man with a Wisconsin Badgers hat,"_ Nigel rushed to say. _"That should stand out enough."_

"_Fine."_

There was a click as the call was disconnected, and then the recording ended.

"She sounds fine, don't you think?" Nigel asked with a small grin. "And before you ask, he turned the phone off already. We can't trace the GPS; I tried."

"It's not funny," Woody shot back, really not seeing the humor in the situation. He wanted to take Nigel by the shoulders and shake him, and scream, _that's my wife, that's Jordan, don't you understand!_ But he couldn't. Instead he just said, "So how do we get this stuff for her?"

"Already got it all," the other man replied, holding up Jordan's brown leather purse with one hand as he saved the recording file and began to separate the pieces of it. He didn't even bother asking if the were going under the radar with Woody's boss on this. "You'll just need to get your fancy hat. Might as well go now; this is going to take a while."

"I'll drive you, Woody." Garret's soft voice from the doorway startled them both, but it was enough to get him to move.

xXx

Their Christmas tree was still bare. They had bought it together two weeks ago, but had yet to put anything on it. Woody had been so excited about getting a tree for their new house, and for their first Christmas as a "real"…well, whatever they were. He hadn't had a word for them then, either. He wasn't sure if Jordan did, herself, and she had just chuckled when he stuttered and let the sentence fade off as they lugged the giant fir inside, getting it set up peacefully in the corner by the living room window. Everything had seemed perfect at the time.

But then it had just sat there.

Woody had pulled all of his old ornaments out of the boxes where they had been stored away, and they were waiting in piles on the mantle and coffee table. When he had asked Jordan to get hers, too, so they could decorate the tree together – that's where things had stalled. She'd suddenly been called into work on an emergency and the tree had been left bare, since he hadn't wanted to decorate without her.

It was the first thing he noticed now as he unlocked the front door to let himself and Garret inside. The undecorated tree, sitting forlornly in the corner, dark and untouched. It may as well have been the middle of summer, for how out of place that tree looked, even despite the wreath he had hung on the door and the wonderfully scented evergreen garlands he had looped over the banister and across the walls.

"I'll just…just go get my hat," Woody muttered, walking briskly to the stairs and taking them two at a time, wanting desperately to get out of the living room and away from that depressing scene.

"Everything is going to be okay," Macy called after him, his words trying to sound bracing. "Jordan's been in much worse situations."

He knew that was true. It was. And from the way she had been snapping at her "kidnapper" on the phone, it certainly seemed like she had everything under control on her end. But they still had no idea where she was, or even if she truly was okay, and just because she had been in those worse situations did not mean this one was any easier on Woody.

He found his hat right where he had left it – on a shelf in the closet, after having been worn in the falling snow a few days before – and clenched it between his hands as he turned to go. But then, almost as an afterthought though he had been thinking about it the entire time they'd been driving to the house, he went back to the closet and grabbed a clean set of clothes for himself, as well as some new clothes for Jordan that could easily be shoved into her large purse. He even snatched her tennis shoes (the ones she wore when she went for a walk, not her good running shoes) from the floor by the closet door as he finally left and made his way back down the stairs.

"Okay," he said, his voice devoid of emotion when he saw Garret still standing in the living room near the front door. "Let's go."

xXx

The park was cold and mostly empty from this side as Jay drove his beat-up '96 Firebird around the block onto Beacon Street and bringing the winter-bare Boston Common into view. Jordan stared out the bit of window visible from the back seat, sighing out her agitation as Jay peered at her from the rearview mirror.

"Do you see any of your cop buddies?" he asked, just a hint of worry in his words.

She blinked, focusing a bit more on the one lone but very dedicated jogger making a round in the icy chill, the woman stopped to talk on her cell as she dug gloves out of her jacket pockets, and the man bundled up and walking his dog. All of them were police she recognized as Woody's friends. Poor Chandler was the jogger. "Nope," she answered.

"Right," he responded dryly, looking at her again in the mirror. "Lie down or something. I don't want anyone to see you, just in case."

"You could have left me in the house," Jordan shot back, almost grinning at the small smile tugging Madge's lips during the exchange. The other woman sat in the front passenger seat, squinting through the overcast sunlight. But even as Jay hastily reminded her about being careful, she just did as she was told and pulled her legs up into the seat so she could lean low against the side of the awkwardly placed arm rest. It was terribly uncomfortable, and she shifted a bit in a useless attempt to situate herself in the small back seat.

As she did so, however, she cast her gaze out the back windshield as the car left the premises of the park and just caught a glimpse of Woody hurriedly walking to the set meeting point inside the expansive park. He was looking anxiously over each shoulder with every few steps, his face pale and drawn with the straps of her purse clutched tightly in one hand. Her breath caught in her throat at the sight and she bit her lip tightly to stop the sudden gasp from escaping.

She had known he would be the one to bring the bag, but she hadn't expected to actually see him herself. He looked horrible.

"Aren't you going to park the car?" she asked shortly, now not bothering to hide the tension that had just begun to build in her stomach. "I want to get this over with."

"_You_ want to get this over with?" Jay retorted baldly, braking at a red light now several streets north of Beacon Street and turning around to look at her. His face was as nervous as she was starting to feel. "You do realize, don't you, that all three of us are putting our lives in danger by getting you your precious medicine? You're just a distraction, that's all. Our 'employer' could decide to end this little project the second it gets too messy, and that means we'll all be dead."

He turned back to the front before Jordan could respond, and she found she had nothing to say anyway. For the first time, she began to feel as though her life were truly in danger.

After another few minutes of driving and doubling around, Jay pulled over and parallel parked, casually getting out of the car to put coins in the meter. He slid back into his seat and pulled the door closed, bringing with him a puff of bitter cold air. "Okay, Madge. Go. We'll wait here." The woman nodded and, without a word, got silently out of the car and walked away, hands stuffed in her pockets.

Jordan sank down into the seat, not watching her go. All she had wanted to do was get Nigel that phone call.

xXx

Woody paced fretfully in front of the Soldiers and Sailors memorial statue, his eyes moving this way and that yet not focusing on anything at all. He knew he was surrounded by fellow officers, that there were people he knew everywhere canvassing the area, collecting information and making sure everything ran smoothly. They'd even already been in touch with the proper government agencies to get street surveillance video and camera shots, so every base was covered.

But he was nervous. Nervous and angry, and he couldn't help but feel as though not enough was being done to bring Jordan back. Nigel was still back in the lab analyzing what they had and awaiting everything they would be bringing back now, but what if it still wasn't enough?

A sudden scuffing of feet on the pathway brought his attention up. A stick-thin woman with a threadbare coat was shuffling toward him, her head down against the wind that had started to pick up again.

She peered at him wryly. "I'm assuming you're the person I'm supposed to meet?" she asked, her voice harsher than she meant it to be. "I'm not from here. I'm going by the fact that you're holding that bag pretty awkwardly, not the surroundings." Madge pointed an ungloved finger at Jordan's purse, which was hanging from Woody's iron grip like a dead limb.

He just stared at her icily, taking in her sickly appearance and hoarse voice, the frizzy hair and sunken cheeks. _Drug addict_, his instincts told him quickly.

Madge took another step forward and held out her hand, the muscles in her arms trembling just a bit but from neither fear nor the chill. "Can I have that, please?"

Woody didn't give the purse to her, seemingly frozen in place as he watched her, looking for any signs to tell him where she had come from. "Where's Jordan?" he asked, the words dropping out of his mouth like rocks in that cold air. "Is she okay?"

She regarded him for a long moment, glancing around briefly herself before stepping close and taking the bag out of his grip. He let her, his face only holding concern for the woman he was looking for as the anger faded slightly to become a familiar lump in his stomach. Madge lifted the bag over her shoulder, noticing its weight and not saying anything about it. Instead, she leaned close and whispered, "She's safe. She's angry and annoyed, but she's fine and I'm trying to keep her that way."

"Where is she," Woody demanded again, leaning back to look Madge in the face. Any compassion was gone, and he grabbed her arm in frustration before she had a chance to retreat. "Where is she!"

Madge didn't shake off his grasp, but turned to meet his furious blue eyes with a piercing gaze of her own. "If I told you, we would all die," she hissed. "I pretend not to notice or care, but I do. So take what you have and find her yourself. And also take my warning – don't follow me, or we're all as good as dead anyway. He'll know."

He dropped his hand, feeling sick and watching as she trotted away. The wire he'd been wearing caught the entire exchange, but it wasn't enough. He was just more confused than he had been before.

xXx

Nigel was still bowed over his computer terminal in the lab when Woody returned, Chandler, who was growing impatient now, on his heels.

"I just don't understand why you aren't handing this entire investigation over to the police!" Elliot pointed out for the third time since they'd arrived back at the building. "Look, I know she's your girlfriend, but you know as well as I do that we have very good people on that team who could find her!"

Woody just shook his head, not listening to a word his partner was saying. "We do things differently around here," he muttered distractedly.

"No," Chandler pointed out baldly. "You all do things differently around _her_. What is it about this woman that makes everyone bend over backwards and put their jobs on the line?"

The question was innocent enough, and Nigel answered before Woody had a chance to retort. "You haven't had the pleasure of working with her more than once, have you mate?"

The detective shook his head, shrugging helplessly when it became apparent he would be getting support for his argument nowhere. "Only the one case a few months ago."

"Jordan puts her job on the line for us; we owe it to her to do the same." Nigel grinned sadly. "Though perhaps in Woody's case, at least in the beginning, it had a bit more to do with, shall we say, winning her attentions? I am pleased to see it worked for him when it failed so _many_ before him."

"Nigel," Woody growled, leaning menacingly close over his desk and nearly knocking over a stale cup of coffee. "Have you got anything?"

"Much, in fact. Would you like to take a listen?" He started to hand a pair of thick earphones to him but quickly stopped upon realizing that he was not, in fact, in any mood to joke or beat around to bush. "Right, then. She's being held near a big body of water. A well-timed boat can be heard in the background of the phone call, so it's somewhere boats can pass unimpeded. An older building, most likely, as I caught a furnace take three attempts to turn on. Based on the distances between the two – Jordan and her captor – the room where they were is small, and above ground. There are at least two levels."

Woody stared at him incredulously, tired and starting to feel the weight of the last few hours hitting him hard. "That's it? You can't narrow it down any more than that?"

"You'd do well to drop that attitude," Nigel said sharply, giving him a glare before opening another program and grabbing a sheet of paper from the desk beside him. "I'm doing the best I can. But if you want magic tricks, fine. Her mobile's signal pinged off two cell towers during the call. That allows us to narrow the field considerably – somewhere between the Boston Inner Harbor and the mouth of the Mystic River." He shoved the cell report into Woody's chest, forcing him to take it.

"But that's still -"

Not giving him a chance to rebuke the findings, the criminologist narrowed his eyes, showing the signs of strain and exhaustion for the first time. "Give me a chance to review the images from the park and track things from there before you tell me it's _not enough_."

"Fine," Woody agreed, feeling fully chastised.

Chandler took a deep breath from behind the pair, watching them silently before speaking. "Maybe we should give this information to our guys at the precinct and let them take it from here. Don't you think you're toeing the line just a little too much, Hoyt?"

Instead of bristling at the question this time, Woody backed away from the counter where Nigel was already working again and turned his flustered blue eyes to his partner's, which were only filled with concern.

"Let's see how close Nigel can get. If he finds her…I'll give it to them then."


End file.
